elements of demographic, socio-cultural and historical evolution of human settlements
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Egyptian civilisation is characterised by the lack of large urban centres. This is particularly unusual considering the high degree of political control exercised by the pharaohs and the fact that ancient, powerful, centralised states such as this one almost always had major urban centres as capitals. Indeed, Egypt has often been called a ‘civilisation without cities’, but this definition only makes sense if we follow the demographic definition of the citystates mentioned above. The development of densely populated urban centres would not occur until the New Kingdom (1550-1070 B.C.), indeed until the reign of Pharaoh Akhenaten, from 1377 to 1358 B.C., when he founded a new imperial capital at Amarna, historically considered a city from every point of view, especially in terms of design and architecture. Civilisations far from the Mediterranean: Asia, the Americas, the Indian subcontinent and sub-Saharan Africa In northern China, the peoples of the Longshan culture urbanised very early, about 5000 years ago and in the Indus Valley (southern Asia) Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa also became important urban centres at roughly the same time. In the Americas, early urban cultures include that of the Olmecs in Mesoamerica, and those known as Norte Chico and later Chavín in Peru. Urban centres developed in North America among Ancestral Pueblo and Mississippian peoples during the second millennium B.C. Early African cities included Great Zimbabwe (1000 B.C.) and Timbuktu (about 800 B.C.).
